Day 155 – Considering Sortie Runs Outside of Langley

It has been a little while since we have made any sort of excursion out into the big wide world. And even when we were making our sortie runs, they were never outside of Langley. The group has been talking and some members have been talking about making a run into some of the surrounding towns. While I would hardly consider places like Pryor, Vinita or Grove to be “densely populated,” they were much larger areas of commerce and therefore were home to many more businesses.

More businesses means more supplies. A place like even a rinky-dink Walmart could be a gold mine of supplies: Ammunition like .22 bullets and shotgun shells, sleeping bags, Coleman lanterns. We are looking for supplies that we just could not find here in Langley. It is risky but if the larger towns were hit as hard as we were with the initial attack of zero hour, the towns could have been cleared out of people and then the zom hordes could have shambled off in the direction of more populated areas like Claremore, Tulsa, and Joplin. Being 155 days in, I would think the all-you-can-eat buffet may be closed in those towns and the zoms moved on. If that is the case, then all those supplies would just be ours for the taking.

Eric and his crew came up by way of the turnpike and when they came through Adair, the place was a ghost town. They said there were a few threats but nothing that could not have been taken down by a prepared group. They just had bad timing with the flat tires and a wandering pack. But still, how long ago was that?  

The group does seem to be running pretty smart with this plan. They want to take two vehicles for redundancy. And they are just talking about testing the waters. It is twelve minutes from Langley to Adair and then nine minutes from Adair to Pryor. They can be back in an hour if reports don’t go the way we want.

Ordinarily, I would be opposed to a run like this but a shopping cart filled with .22 bullets and shotgun shells is a freaking game changer. .22 shells are sold in 550 rounds per box. Can you imagine how well armed we would be if we could loot a Walmart.

Now granted, Walmart could be completely cleared out. We just don’t know. For all we know, there could be people holed up in Walmart surviving as well and if that is the case, then there is no way we will be able to talk them out of giving up their stores. But if no one is there, that place is just ripe for the picking. And even if Pryor is barricaded up, Vinita might not be. Grove might not be. All these towns have a Walmart.

And this is not some pansy run for makeup and Xbox games. The primary thing that our crew is looking for is ammunition and any guns behind the counter. Pryor has a pretty extensive number of pawn shops. I can think of three immediately in the town. Those guns and that ammo could be the difference between life and death.

So, we are considering it. This was our debate at breakfast this morning. I will keep you informed when we make a decision…

Day 153 – A Man’s Physical Needs

I debated about even posting on this because the only one that might find it interesting is me… Last week, we all watched Brad and Kasondra get married. The booze was flowing. Everyone was having a good time. People were dancing and singing and enjoying the moment.

When you are single, sex gets pushed to the back of your brain. What I mean is when you are married and sleeping next to someone, it doesn’t really compute for a couple not to have sex on a regular basis. It’s right there next to you. What stops you from rolling over and giving her (or him) a little squeeze to kick start things?

But when you are single and sleeping alone, you take your shower, climb into bed, and try to stay awake long enough to finish The Colbert Report. Then you go to sleep. Sure, you wish that you had someone to be with but if that option is not on the table, you just kind of push it off the agenda. There is no chance of it happening, so your brain just doesn’t focus on it. If you are married, there is a chance, you hope for it, and if it happens it happens. But that chance of it happening can dominate your thoughts.

Like if you buy a lottery ticket, you cannot help but think about what you do with the money. With no ticket, why even think about it? It is wasted energy because there is no chance of it happening. Man, remember when there was a lottery? And money? I always said that if I won the lottery, my first car that I would buy is the 2012 Transformers Special Edition Chevy Camaro. But the car that I would have custom built would be a drivable replica of The Tumbler from Batman Begins. Street legal. You might ask me what I would do with that… Uh, drive it to the grocery store to buy milk, of course. I kinda feel like I went off on a tangent there… Back on track!

Anyway, at the wedding reception, I kissed somebody. Maybe it was the booze, the mood, the event or what have you. It was the first romantic contact I have had with someone since… since… Well, it has been a very long time.

I am not going to lie. It was very, very nice. A person wants to be wanted. It is one thing to kiss a young lady. It is a whole other animal if she kisses back. Now, it was just a kiss. That morning after when the crew all got together for breakfast, we didn’t really discuss it. She just winked at me and smiled from across the table. But still, I have to nip this in the bud.

I can’t. I have Alex to think about. On top of everything he has gone through, the last thing he really needs is to see his father kissing a woman that is not his mom. There has to be some mental trauma there if that happens. And I don’t want to add to his burden. He is being forced to grow up too fast as it is. He doesn’t have any other kids his age to play with. Kilo is his best friend in this place. Fred spends a lot of time with Alex. I think it is one of those relationships where Alex gets a grandfather figure and Fred gets to be a grandpa. (That is a role he is very good at too.) 

I really don’t want to add to his stress or burdens… But her lips were so soft and inviting… No. No. No. Focus on the task at hand. Killing zoms. Killing zoms. Killing zoms. Back to business…

Day 152 – The Bob Initiative

Here is something that you “city folk” might not know. If you are going to have a snake on your property, the one you want is a black snake. The reason why is because they are nonpoisonous and they are fiercely territorial. This means they drive off all the other snakes, including the poisonous ones.

So we are curious to know how zombies work. In theory, if there are too many zoms limping around in one area, we have reason to believe that an exodus might be in order. Otherwise, why would we see so many shambling packs of these things traveling down the highway? Obviously, they are looking for a more viable food source. So a fairly large city like Claremore gets overrun. The whole population has been transformed. Even all the dogs and cats have been gobbled up. Zoms don’t eat each other. So what is a zom to do?

If our observations are right, you could suggest that some of the more isolated zoms might “power down” as we have explained before. However, zoms respond to movement. Any movement. Including movement of other zoms. This is why cities full of these things never go into a power down mode. They just keep shuffling.

Now those zoms who are on the outskirts of Claremore, say the south side, may eventually get it through their rotting heads that there is no more food to be chased. At which point, one Alpha Male looks in the direction of Catoosa and that wide open stretch of highway. They think to themselves, “I bet food is down there” and they shamble off. Those closest in the direction of that Alpha Male start following and the next thing you know, the herd is off and shambling. And then you get that domino effect where the larger the horde, the more like are that other zoms are going to join in. Some zoms will be too stupid, too isolated, or to injured to keep up. They get left behind and inevitably become the powered down zoms as have been discussed.

Now, granted, we cannot do scientific tests or anything but the logic sounds pretty freakin’ stable. So if a horde of zoms comes staggering through Langley, we want them to just cruse on by and keep shuffling down the road. How can we do that? Because if a horde catches scent of 20+ people trapped in this grocery store, they could come at us full force and it could be so relentless that they find their way in and we cannot fend them off. So how do we keep them all shamblin’ on?

I think we need to fool them into believing that zoms have already conquered the town and that there is no food left. Now, the counterpoint to this argument is that if a horde rolls through and they see a bunch of fellow zoms already in town, the horde may hang out to see why the original crew hasn’t shuffled down the road like they are doing. It is a legitimate possibility.

However, much the same way that zoms don’t eat other zoms, we have a theory that zoms can sense a certain level of distress in fellow zombies. I believe that zoms can tell if other zoms are eating good or not. It is more of an instinctual thing but I think they just no.

Now, before you read our next statement, I need to reiterate something here. You are on my side. I’ve talked about my kid, my parents, God, my love of Arnold Schwarzenegger, boobies, all that sort of stuff. So I am normal. I am not some serial killer in training posing as a normal human being. You got that? Okay…

I am calling this “The Bob Initiative.” We need to start capturing zoms and incapacitating them. Then we cut off their arms and legs. This leaves them to be just a torso and a head. (So, yes, if we dropped them in the lake they would bob up and down in the water.)  We then take these undying, undead torsos and heads and lash them to T-Posts. T-Posts are metal poles that you make barbed wire fences with. We then take these zombie-carry fence posts out to the grassy ditches outside the store and start setting up a perimeter of starving zoms that cannot go anywhere. All they can do is wail and gnash their teeth… unless we remove their teeth too.

Then, if a horde rolls through, they will think A) this place is already filled with zoms, B) surely everything has already been eaten, C) these dudes ain’t doing so hot, and finally D) maybe we should just keep on moving.

The perimeter fence of zoms should mask our presence but still be far enough out that we are not smelling them like last week’s road kill. I know that this whole article makes me seem like a demented serial killer but I really think this logic is sound. However, even I will admit that just typing this out makes me sound scary and introducing it to the group will not be an easy sell.

But I have time on my hands. My theory is that we should go after the T-Post Zoms during the winter months when they are frozen from the cold, making them easier and safer to bring down…

Jeez, I need to go watch a marathon of Disney movies or something to lighten my brain up…   

Day 151 – Zombiology 101: Man-Made Disease?

Last week, one of our sortie teams came across a collection of zombies that were feasting on the corpse of a cow. I contemplated this fact as I wondered how a pack of zombies could bring down a cow. I mean an average person against a cow? The cow is winning that battle. If you have never been close to an animal of this size, their power is unbelievable. I mean a mature Black Angus cow can weigh 1500 pounds. Put that up against a 150 pound zombie? The zombie doesn’t stand a chance.

I have been out walking in the pasture with my son and when the cattle get spooked and take off, the ground shakes. You may not realize this but cows can move. They can haul if they need to and any shambling zom could be easily trampled underfoot by these things. There is a reason why the stampede is used in all those Western cowboy films. Still, what was bugging me was I could not wrap my brain around how these things could drag down a cow. The only real weapon that zoms have are their teeth. Now, the bites are savage and they can tear apart living flesh like it is a cooked chicken. But a cow? That is a lot of mass stomping around. How do zoms take down a cow? Well, I have a theory.

Cow tipping is real. You can do it. Granted Tommy Boy gave a humorous take on the thing but if a cow is asleep, you can kind of creep up on one. Granted, zombies smell like putrid death but if one got close enough, it is possible that a zom takes a chunk out of this thing. We have seen already. One bite is all it takes.

So a zom shambles up and takes a bite. The cow snaps awake and gives a kick, crunching the zom’s chest into oblivion but that does not kill it. So the cow takes off across the pasture, bleeding out like crazy. There are no bandages, no medical treatment, no emergency veterinary dispatched.

And that leaking blood trail is easily tracked by zoms. Don’t get me wrong, I loved Zack Snyder’s take on zombies in Dawn of the Dead but those zombies would have torn the dog “Chips” to pieces. Meat is meat.

Back to the point at hand, the zoms shamble after the bit and bleeding cow. Eventually, that cow is going to bleed out and collapses in the field. And, eventually, those zoms are going to catch up to the cow near death and – voile – they have an all-you-can-eat buffet.  Now, we have never seen a zombie cow or a zombie dog. Most dogs seem smart enough to smell these things coming from a mile away and bolt the other direction. We have yet to see an undead cow feasting on other members of the herd.  Try to imagine defending anywhere from a contaminated mouse or rat. A Kharon-infected mosquito?

At this point in the game, whatever this virus or microbial infection is it seems to only trigger in the brain of the homo sapiens. Only the human brain is reanimated because of the disease. I wonder how that works? But I have to admit, that does really lend to my theory that this is some form of man-made disease. How else could you explain it? What if this was some biological agent designed in some secret government facility that was released accidentally? I guess we may never know…

But here is my concern. Kilo is Eric’s German Shepherd. What happens in defense of his master if he takes a bite of a zom?

Day 150 – Old Lives vs. Today’s Lives

Dillon, Kasondra, and Kelsey at an OKC Thunder game... long before...

I know you might wonder why we only post old picture taken from phone data and what we could still pull off of Facebook. Yes, people do have access to their phones. We have chargers. And we have even snapped some pictures of these zoms slobbering around. But we are not posting them.

I mean we could have taken pictures of Kyndall and Wes when they came into the store. But any picture taken would have shown those two in the world that we live in now. Wes admitted to giving up shaving (not a big deal) but Kyndall did too (a very big deal). Thankfully, we still had a pretty big stock of lady razors on hand… Back on topic, we are hoping that Wes and Kyndall’s parents will respond to the emails that we sent out to their addresses. Maybe they are surfing this site right now and, if that is the case, they wanted their parents to see them as they were in the real world. Not how they are now.

We do the same thing with all the initial survivors too. If any member of our family is lucky enough to find this weblog, we want our people to be immediately recognized and I feel like we do that with pictures from our old life, not this life where everything has gone to hell.

I hope that is not a disappointment to you. We have absolutely no idea how far this thing has spread but if movies like Outbreak and Contagion have taught us anything it is that worldwide pandemics can spread easily across the globe now because of things like air travel. And all it takes is one infected person and a populace that does not know what they are dealing with and this infection is wildfire. The fact that it has a name in Kharon leads me to believe that it is in fact everywhere. Add in the Twitter and Facebook crashes and it just seems to be even more evidence. 

Maybe I am wrong. Maybe it is localized to just the American Midwest. And if that is the case then maybe you are lucky enough to be reading this from a region that has not been affected by this, then I would imagine a lot of people would like to see the zombies. I imagine it is no different than a horrible car crash or a fat lady in spandex. You don’t want to look but you have to.

Rubberneckers are crawling down the southbound lane of 169 even though the wreck is all the way over in the northbound lane. Why? Because they want to see blood or a body.

I will say this about Hollywood. Their makeup artists are pretty good. If you have seen one decent zombie movie with more than a hundred bucks in the special effects budget, you can pretty much imagine what these things look like. And if I am right about the global pandemic thing, if you haven’t seen one yet, trust me, you will.

So we are going to keep things on the lighter side on this blog and try to cling to what we were in our past life. Because that is the life we all want to get back to and with a little luck maybe we will.  

Day 149 – FoS: Washing Machine & Dryer

I enjoyed working for Reason’s but the only problem I ever really had was the upper levels of management. Not the management in the store but the corporate guys that would come to check in once a month. It was just like anything. Some of them were cool. Others were complete tools. I guess it is neither here nor there. But these are the guys that were in charge of all the executive decisions that got sent down to all the different stores. A couple of years ago, the corporate goons sent down this idea that we were going to do in-house cleaning of things like meat coats, bakery smocks, produce aprons, and all the other uniforms that we used in the store. So they brought up a pretty large washing machine and dryer for us to use.

Yeah. That lasted about a week.

Then we switched over to farming out the cleaning to some new company that signed some contract with Reason’s. Well, they just left the washer and dryer in the store. Now, it was used every once in a while if it rained really hard. Guys would throw their jackets in the dryer every once and again. So thankfully, we have access to a washer and dryer to help us out with our clothes. And we have all kinds of laundry soap available so that is not really an issue.

Note: While they are not the most stylish of apparel, the jackets that are provided for the produce and bakery are pretty rough and tumble. The fabric is thick and designed for a work environment so they make for nice things to wear while we are working around the store.

Thankfully, Yulonda was thinking ahead when all this went down and she brought over fresh socks and underwear. The sortie teams have been pretty smart with a lot of the houses that have been close. A prime target was the apartments right across the street. Once those apartments were swept and cleared, they started looting things out of season like heavy winter coats and extra blankets.

I know in all the zombie movies, the people are always gross and their clothes are filthy. I know it is done for dramatic effect in those films. It is just not accurate with us. If you are imagining us wearing the same clothes day in and day out, that is just not the case. With Langley wiped out so quickly, there are more clothes hanging in closets than we can wear. The tough part is humping them back to the store and getting it inside. You don’t realize how much space clothes take up until you try to stuff five full outfits in a backpack. Now multiply that times 30 survivors… But we have managed.

Thankfully, we are lucky enough that we have a pretty nice washer and dryer to help us keep clean. And everyone has several changes of clothes to wear. It goes back to that whole thing of it is the end of the world but at least we smell good and clean…

Day 148 – Party Favors and Ear-to-Ear Smiles…

Sequestered away since Friday night, we finally saw Kasondra & Brad emerge from the private bedroom for breakfast Monday morning. I think they were playing Scrabble. Words with Friends? I am not certain.

I guess it is a good thing that Reason’s had a fully stocked pharmacy department. Although our supply of contraceptives does seem to be suspiciously lower than before Friday. I wonder why that is? Was someone making balloon animals? I guess we may never know…

Day 146 – You Were Cordially Invited…

Yesterday was amazing. In the middle of the zombie apocalypse, the survivors barricaded within the Reason’s grocery store in Langley, Oklahoma bore witness to the union of Brad Chambers and Kasondra Taylor. They were married by Fred Cox who we deemed to be the highest ranking member within our group. We vested power in him to be an ordained minister. Kinda doubting that would hold up in a court of law but given how most of the Supreme Court justices and officials for the state of Oklahoma are probably feasting on human flesh right now, sensible reason and normalcy is not really in large supply these days.  

You know, it was the least professionally decorated. It was the least rehearsed. We did our best with what music we had available. Decorations consisted of origami flowers made from paper napkins. And yet, this event thrown together in a matter of hours was one of the more romantic things I have seen.

The logical side of my brain will tell you that the whole thing was pointless. Fred is not a minister. The state of Oklahoma (if that even still exists) certainly is not going to recognize this as legal. But all that kind of falls to the wayside in times like this doesn’t it?

I have known people that are legally married that could not have been less in love and were still bound together only by that legal document. But what Brad and Kasondra have is real. It is a marriage of spirit and soul that is far beyond anything that a legal document could ever state.

Does it matter that they were married in the center aisle of the store? Hey, as my dad used to say, “You dance with the one that brung ya.” This is what we had available so this is what we work with.

I am sure not every bride wants to walk down the aisle while the wedding march plays from the crappy speakers of a laptop computer. But we all did get a good laugh when the YouTube video buffered right in the middle of Kasondra’s walk. She handled it like a champ. She just stopped in mid stride, waited for the music to start back and then continued her walk down the aisle. Naturally, this drew a big laugh from the “congregation” – which I think is what you need.

Okay, sure if you are Prince William and Kate Middleton, the weddings should maybe be solemn and dignified. And I am not saying you need to throw all decorum out the window and go all Honey Boo Boo either. But if you are getting married in the center aisle of a grocery store while the risen dead and milling around outside your door, I think a little laughter is in order.

Kim was beaming. Janet, the mother of the groom, couldn’t stop crying. We all ate from some of the private reserves, you know, the good stuff. We even popped a few bottles of Champaign that we looted from the liquor store next door. We were holding them back for New Year’s Eve but we felt this was a completely appropriate time to dip into the stash.

I questioned the logistics of Brad’s plan but I am very happy to say that I was wrong. The level of morale within the group was fantastic. People danced and laughed and shared in a wonderful time. We are all in a good place.

I hope that if you are reading this, you are too…

 

Day 145 – You Are Cordially Invited to Be Fab-you-luss!

Today is the big day. Kasondra and Brad are getting married. Nolan insisted that everyone needed to be “fabulous!” for Kasondra’s wedding. He even snapped his fingers and flailed his hand over his head when he said it. Okay, that is not true but he was pretty adamant about wanting everyone to look fantastic for the very special day. So literally, everyone came through the station that he had set up for us in the Produce Prep Room. He had Ashlynn and Kelsey helping him out as his assistants. I am not really one for something like this but I have to admit, his set up was pretty freaking cool. (Keep in mind that we have a lot of downtime on our hands.)

Nolan had three chairs set up. He assigned everyone in the store a number and would have Kelsey call you back to the Produce over the intercom when it was your time. He had Hobbit Judy help him set up every blender from off the shelf and made all kinds of fruity mixed drinks. They had fruit cocktails to snack on and all kind of finger foods. They set up their own music station on the Produce Department’s computer. He then had Kim put on special music for whoever was sitting in the styling chair at that time. “DJ Kim Jong Ill! Spin that shit!” kind of became Nolan’s catchphrase.
So he had people constantly coming and going, working them like an assembly line but at the same time, he has his schedule down to maximize time. Nothing seemed hurried or rushed. Using that hose and the big industrial sink, everyone got shampooed and conditioned thanks to Ashlynn while Nolan was overseeing. Then they moved to the next chair where Nolan went to work. Girls would stay behind and gab while Nolan did his thing. He was the one doing all the work but I think he enjoyed it more than we did.
For the guys, it was pretty cut and dried. Fred, Lance, Hunter, Luke, Tommy all these guys kept their hair pretty high and tight before the zombie apocalypse. And me? I’ve been shaving my head for the past five years. It is like we were all extras on Breaking Bad. Fred did seem to have more fun with it than most allowing Nolan to color his hair to a get rid of the gray. He even colored his mustache. Want to know something really cool though? Knowing about Fred’s alcoholism, Nolan made sure to have a special booze-free fruity drink for him. I thought that was really awesome.
So, since my “haircut” was so simple, Nolan did for me the whole hot towel routine with a neck and shoulder massage. That was pretty freaking cool and then he shaved my face for me. If you have never had that done, it is a wonderful feeling of pampering.
But the girls are where Nolan really shined. They have full access to the HBC aisle where they got to choose whatever color, style, trim or cut that they wanted. They did VO5 hot oil treatments (whatever those do) and basically ransacked that whole cosmetic aisle. After hair was done, Kimber had a desk set up where she was doing fake nails and fingernail painting for the ladies. (Yes, she gave me a manicure with a coat of clear polish. Lance won’t let me hear the end of it.) But she wasn’t going anywhere near my feet.
Truly, it was a really special day. He styled Brad first and Kasondra last so that they couldn’t see each other. And I, swear, he fussed over Kas for over an hour. I cannot remember more laughter and pure enjoyment from the group since the Memorial Day cookout. I truly forgot that it was the end of the world outside.  

   

Day 145 – So Busy…

We have a whole lot going on today so the blog is going to be a little bit late. Don’t worry though. Really good news to report!

Day 144 – Zombiology 101: Strength in Numbers

Because the sheer numbers of zombies have started to dwindle down a bit and we are getting better at navigating outside, we have been making more and more sorties out for supplies. We came across a pretty interesting fact when one of our teams was out scavenging. Our mentality has always been to run away to fight another day. Fight back from a place of strength. The team made some miscalculations as far as ammo goes. On their way back to the store, the team was outpacing a pair of zombies. They made it through the roll up door and locked it down. The two zombies were banging against the barricades, moaning and scratching away. But they seemed to keep at a lot longer than normal. Eventually, we sniped the zoms out and shot them from the other roll up door. But it did get us questioning…

Before, when people running through the streets screaming, zoms would come and bang against the doors but then when they realized they couldn’t get in, they would move on in search of easier prey. Now, the easy targets seem to be less and less available. We don’t have people running through the streets, screaming their heads off anymore. So these two zoms came up and were banging against the door. And they just didn’t seem to stop, despite the fact that we went into lockdown and reduced our signature as much as possible (no sight, no sound, no smell). But these two kept banging away. We couldn’t figure out why. 

We discussed this at length and we think we have come up with a solution. If it just would have been a single zom, Zombie Jerry, we are betting he would have just shuffled off once that sensory stimuli was forgotten about. But you had Zombie Jerry chasing after our sortie team and loping along beside him is Zombie Beth. The sortie team gets inside and shuts the door. Zombie Jerry and Beth hit up against the door, knowing that there is meat on the other side of the door.

They are clawing and scratching at the door. If it was just Zombie Jerry or just Zombie Beth, chances are they would have just shuffled off. But Zombie Jerry is banging against the door. Now, Zombie Beth sees Zombie Jerry scratching at the door, in her half-functioning brain, she thinks, “Grrr. Brains. There must be meat behind that door. He is on to something!” And so she starts scratching and banging at the door. By now, Zombie Jerry might have shambled off on his own but then he looks over and sees Zombie Beth banging at the door. And so in his half-functioning brain, he thinks, “Grrr. Brains. There must be meat behind that door. She is on to something!” And the two just keep perpetually stimulating the other to keep tearing down that door. This shows that the zombies are pretty dumb and go off instinctual thinking. But this also does not bode well for us.

Granted, even with the doors barricaded, I don’t want two zoms banging against the outside door. If any other zoms are shuffling past, they could add to the number banging against the door. So we have to go through and clear those doors from threats. Even water, given enough time and pressure can penetrate rock.

And like Corp. Hicks once warned, “We can’t afford to let one of those bastards in here…”

Day 143 – Staying Bonded Together

I used to love to watch those reality game shows like SURVIVOR and BIG BROTHER. I was never certain if I could handle the physical athleticism of something like SURVIVOR but I always knew I would win BIG BROTHER if I could get on the show. Before I started shaving my head, I always used to joke that if I could lose about fifty pounds and gain about three inches of hairline, I totally would have sent in an audition tape. Well, one of the things that you hear contestants complain about on that show is the amount of time that is spent with people. Because you are not just on the show with people for 39 days, you are spending 39 straight days with people. 24 hours a day for 39 days.

I used to joke that during busy times at work (Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Thanksgiving) when everyone was working overtime that I saw them more than my family. And that was about fifty hours for a week. We are now 143 days in of constant contact with one another. No breaks. No getting outside or away from one another. Now, granted, the store is big enough so that everyone can break up and do his or her own thing. And we do all still take our meals together. I still truly believe that eating together helps us stay bonded.

I guess it is only natural but I have started to see little cliques forming amongst the groups. This is not a bad thing. Hunter, Kanen & Lance are going to have more in common. They will not hang out as much with Janet, Sharon, and Fred. I don’t see Kelsey having long conversations with Judy about the plethora of things they have in common. Now that is not to say that there isn’t some mentorship going on. Be it Sharon teaching me the finer points of country cooking or Fred teaching Alex how to strip down and clean the weapons, there is a parental vibe going on.

It works the other way too, I won’t mention names but I saw a session involving some of the older ladies learning how to do the “Dougie.” You might call it the “Cat Daddy.” Maybe it has a regional name. I don’t know. It’s the Kate Upton dance.

Regardless, I do still think it goes back to my September 1tth post. I think we all get along… because we have to. Back when I was a kid, my family took a vacation down to the Bahamas. It was my dad, my mom, my sister and me on a twenty-one foot sailboat. And there were times where you could look around all 360-degrees and see nothing but ocean. In times like that, you have to get along. If you don’t, you kill each other. I think we are in the same scenario here.

As long as the zombie threat exists, we have to get along. No other choice. I think you just let all the petty stuff fall by the wayside for the betterment of the group. In that regard, I think we all get along better than we did before the Apocalypse.

I suppose a family rat holed up in their attic surviving on Spam and bottled water will find the children getting along swimmingly. After all, vocal arguments will only keep the zoms around that much longer. So I guess if you are looking for a silver lining in all of this… there is that.

 

Day 142 – Fortress of Solitude: The Intercom System

Like the majority of businesses, Reason’s was outfitted with dozens upon dozens of speakers wired into the ceiling to broadcast their music and in-store advertising. Rather than have one loud speaker, you have dozens of small speakers so that the music levels are even throughout the store. It is through this system that Kim broadcasts her iPod and gets us music.

This also gives us access to the store’s intercom system. Wired up in every department is a phone that two “lines.” There is a red line and a green line. If you are on one phone and hit the green line, someone else on another phone can hit the green line and you can talk with one another.

There is also a button to activate the store’s intercom. You ding this button on the receiver and everything you say goes out over the intercom. This is how Kim broadcasts the music. She just dings the receiver button and lodges it with a folded up piece of paper so that it stays on. She then puts the phone next to the computer speakers and we have quality tunes to go about our work day.  

We all agreed that the intercom is the best way to inform everyone if there is a breach in security or if we need to go “all stop, quick quiet” because there are zoms milling around outside. The whole goal if zoms start creeping is to make like a whole in the world… until the snipers can get into position.

And then there is the “Alamo” call. No one wants to issue the Alamo call. That is if we have been breached beyond any hope. If the Produce roll up door was ripped off its hinges, no way of getting us back into a state of lock down, then the call for Alamo would go out. Everyone knows the ultimate fallback is to get to the ice cream freezers. From the ice cream freezers, you can get to the roof and the roof offers us the best chance at sanctuary.

Then we just have to hope we have enough supplies to outlast the zombies that might pour in. We then go into severe quiet mode. We hope that they lose enough interest that they move on or dwindle in number enough that we could re-secure the breach, mop up any more that are still inside and retake the store.

Sealing the breach is the most critical part of that plan though. Without a breach being fixed, you could kill a thousand zoms and more and more could still come through. We are not sure if the Intercom system will still work in the event of power failure. I doubt that was given priority status.

I just pray to God no one ever has to make that call.

Day 141 – The Perfect White Dress, Part II

Brad and his crew made it back safe and sound. Dress and suit are in hand. Kasondra has no idea. I will say this. This weekend should be interesting…

 

Day 141 – The Perfect White Dress

I want this officially recorded as the dumbest idea in the history of dumb ideas. I considered it a miracle when Brad and his crew made it over from ACE Hardware. Now, given the level of weapons that they had, it was the farthest thing from a suicide run but I think we can all agree that it was dangerous. For those of you that maybe just found this blog, Brad and a small collection of survivors pulled a “blaze of glory” and made it from the hardware store across the street. Brad is/was the fiancé of our Assistant Manager Kasondra Taylor. The two were supposed to be married last summer but, gosh darn it all, zombies have no consideration for people’s social calendars. They just come storming through all, “Braiiinssss.” They could care less how many hours you spent on the seating chart so that you kept your drunken uncle away from your Gam-Gam because when she has too much to drink she gets just a little anti-Semitic and you don’t need to whip up that firestorm frenzy. But I digress… 

Brad has collected together a small team for a sortie run to their house. It is down in the heart of Langley. It is not a far run but it is still far enough away that things could go wrong and they could be compromised. And he is purposefully leaving Kasondra out of the loop for this little sortie. The question you have to ask yourself is: Is this actually worth dying for?

Is the run for more ammo? Then, yes, I support it. Things that will inevitably improve our quality of life like mattresses and extra clothes? I am not so quick to jump on the bandwagon but, yes, I support it if you have a smart plan. But what Brad wants to do…

He wants to go after Kasondra’s wedding dress. He wants to get her dress so that they can get married. I tried (softly mind you) to mention to Brad that we don’t have a preacher, no marriage license, or even a state of Oklahoma to file the marriage license with anymore. But he wanted this done. And I know that this is the dumbest idea ever but if you look in Brad’s eyes and see his conviction… Words just cannot explain it. I know I cannot understand it but I understand it. Logically, it makes no sense but I kind of feel like he is pulling a William Wallace just without all the secrecy.

Brad wants to get married. In his mind, he wants a ceremony and to publically declare to everyone that Kasondra is his wife. I get that. Let’s be realistic here. Not to put too fine a point on it but Brad and Kasondra have consummated the marriage several times over (especially after Brad and his crew made it over from ACE). He wants to let Kasondra go through the ceremony and he wants her to look beautiful while doing it. I get it. I really do.

But if something goes wrong…

I guess in theory, anything could go wrong at any time. Hell, I could slip and fall in the Meat Cooler/shower and break my neck. I could fall off the top of the Produce Cooler where Alex and I sleep. A ravenous horde could break in here tomorrow and devour us all. So I guess if Brad needs this and he has a crew that will go with him for protection, who are we to tell him no? 

Day 139 – It’s All Fun and Games Until… Well, This Is All Fun

I never said we were mature. And I think if you want to survive the horrid hellscape that awaits you outside, you have to embrace a little immaturity from time to time. I don’t even know who came up with the idea but they took those little plastic checker pieces from a checkers game off the game rack, threw in one for each person. All of the checkers are red except one. There is one black chip amongst the sea of red. Whoever draws the black chip has to go into the office and sit while everyone else scatters.

It is then a good old fashioned game of hide and seek. But here is the kicker. If you are found, then you become a seeker too. So you can have a great hiding place but if someone else sees you take refuge, if they get caught, they are going to sell you down the river. If you “catch” someone, you get to claim their checker chip.

There are two winners to every game. The last person to go without being discovered is automatically considered one winner. Then, the second winner is whoever claims the most chips from people found throughout the game. It ensures that the seekers don’t really work together and it extends the game substantially.

People have been known to shut off power to the lights, hoping to gain the advantage of darkness. I have seen people trying to use the intercom system to play psychological warfare. I have seen people wall themselves up on shelves, hiding behind packages of toilet paper, hiding in large stock boxes, on top of coolers… I don’t think there is a single nook and cranny that has not been explored and exploited at this point. And then you have to consider, do you find the perfect spot and stay put? Or do you risk trying to go mobile and avoiding the sweepers as they conduct their searches?

 The funniest part of the game is the beginning because no one looks at their checker color when they pull it from the bag. You can see people looking around at each other, sizing each other up and contemplating their strategies. They are doing this while music plays on the intercom. After everyone has their chip, we wait for the song that is currently playing to end. After that, everyone opens their hand. Everyone that is holding red scatters like roaches with the lights coming on and there is always that one loan voice that whines, “Awww man.”

Now the kicker is the song that is playing. You have to pay attention to that song. If it is a song by the Foo Fighters, you don’t have a lot of time to find a good spot. One time when Kanen was seeking, the song that randomly queued in was “Foreplay/Long Time” by Boston. That is almost eight minutes of music for you to hide in. People could have constructed duck blinds with those eight minutes.

Still the undisputed hiding king continues to be Nolan. He holds the record for being the last one found. I cannot tell if he has one really good hiding spot or multiple ones but we rarely see him emerge when the second to the last person is found. It is not like when the call goes out over the intercom that he pops the hatch and says, “Hear I am!” Inevitably, someone just rounds a corner and there he will be. Or when the second to the last person is found, everyone heads back to base and more often than not, Nolan is sitting there waiting for other seekers to show up.

I am telling you, kids, embrace the immaturity. It just might keep you sane.  

Day 138 – Pockets of Civilization?

Today in the twelve o’clock hour, we saw a small caravan of three vans and a mid-sized U-Haul truck come through Langley. They came up Highway 28 from Adair, made the turn onto Highway 82, and then preceded to head north towards Vinita. From there, the roads can take you up to Joplin, Missouri and from there pretty much anywhere in the American Midwest.

Now, we weren’t exactly broadcasting our presence but we were not exactly buttoned up tight either. We are still flying our flags upside down in distress, hoping some military convoy will see us. The caravan slowed down, as if whoever was in the lead vehicle was contemplating something and then they advanced on.

The chances of them doing some sort of secretive double back to hit us under the cover of darkness are pretty unlikely. They have to have seen the barricaded store front, the flapping flags, and considered stopping. But if they are loaded down with supplies and have all that they can carry at the time, why risk it?

For all we know, they cleared out that rinkie-dink grocery store in Salina or Chelsea. Sure, the Tulsa grocery stores probably got looted and picked clean but a small town – overrun before the chaos was telegraphed – that place would be ripe for the picking.

Plus, all you have to do is look around. As of this moment, there are not a lot of walking zoms prowling Langley. Sure, there are the stragglers and we are always at risk to a shambling horde but, right now, there are more bodies littering the parking lots across the way than there are the occasional dawdlers and lingerers. And if these people have survived into September, they must know that you have to brainpan these things to put them down.

If you see a collection of corpses scattered about a parking lot with bullet holes in their skulls and no other major damage, wouldn’t you start looking around wondering where the sniper nest is? Maybe that inadvertent show of force told them to keep bumping it down the road.

I mean, we know that we are nice people but they don’t know that we are nice people. Best to avoid the stress and keep pushing on to wherever they are going. Still, it would be nice to hear some news, see some new faces, or maybe meet some new people…

Maybe this means all hope is not lost? If people are still out there and they are venturing out, maybe there are more survivors than we anticipated. Those cars were headed north. Maybe there is something up north that we don’t know about.

Maybe we are not alone after all…    

Day 138 – No More Survivor Profiles?

I know that Fridays are typically when I post my Survivor Profile articles but as of last week, everyone has been chronicled. Unless we get some new blood in here, I am afraid that this collection of articles will be finished. Maybe I can come up with a different topic to post about on Fridays. I will see what I can come up with…

Honestly, I wish I had more people to talk about. I like everyone that has sought refuge and safe haven with us. I just wish there was more of us so we could become more of a productive force. It would also indicate that there were more survivors.

Maybe we will get lucky and more people will show up…

Day 137 – Zombiology 101: Usain Bolt the Zombie Sprinter

Believe it or not, even as a big guy, before the world all went to Hell, I did try to exercise. I would go up to the track at my old high school, put my MP3 player on, and walk in the evenings after the sun went down. And if I maintained a brisk pace, just walking, I could clear a mile in 16 minutes which is 3.75 miles per hour. It basically broke down to one lap around the track in 4 minutes, which is 100 yards every minute. I would often time it using the length of songs on my MP3. So now, with that in mind, let’s start breaking things down.

Let’s say that your average zombie shuffles along at a pace that is slower than normal walking speed. Let’s say that they are not hustling like they are chasing after someone like a human being or a car. Since they are dead, let’s say that they walk at a speed that is one quarter of a human being.

With their shuffling gait, let’s just say that they cover a distance of one mile per hour.  That’s it. That is all they can shuffle is one mile per hour. But here is the kicker.

They will walk relentlessly for one mile an hour. Sunshine. Rain. Snow. Night. Day. They don’t get tired. They don’t get winded. They shuffle endlessly. And while these things are mindless, they also do not appear to be stupid.

What I mean by that is that when we see these shambling hordes come shuffling through, we rarely see large group walking through the cow pastures behind us or emerging out of the woods. They come from the highways.

With no more cars traveling the highways, you now have these wide open stretches that are easily traversed. Who wants to trudge through the woods? Even a zom knows that is not exactly the literal path of least resistance. So they don’t walk “as the crow flies.” They are shambling along via the highways.

The Will Rogers turnpike is pretty much a straight shot from my hometown of Adair to Tulsa. It also happens to be 49 miles. Which at one mile an hour clearly shows, from Adair, Tulsa is two days walk for a zom.

If Adair, Oklahoma was the epicenter of the outbreak (I know it wasn’t but I am making a point), a zom horde could reach Dallas, Texas in 12 days. New York, New York in 54 days. Los Angeles, California in 62 days.

Yes, granted, that is straight walking with no distractions and no chasing after meat and using the best highways to get them there. But note the date of this entry. This is Day 123. And that is with Adair as the epicenter. Given the Twitter crashes and Facebook shut downs, I am willing to be that the outbreak did not just occur here in Oklahoma. So what does this mean?

I think everyone can agree that there is no part of the United States that could be considered a safe haven at this point. These things could have shambled from Washington State all the way to the Florida Keys by now.

Is there a haven? A safe zone? Anywhere? 

 

Day 136 – Standing Against the Common Threat

136 days ago, I was worrying about my mortgage, needing to get the oil changed in my car, and getting pissed off when power glitches would foul up my DVR and it wouldn't record two channels at once like it is supposed to. Think about that. All these things I thought was so important. Now? I would give vital parts of my anatomy to go back to those days.

When you are surrounded by bloodthirsty reanimated corpses that want nothing more than to chew your guts out, things like worrying about the release date of the latest Ryan Reynolds movie or worrying when the McRib is coming back to McDonalds no longer really seems important.

You know the funny thing is... While not in this context, I said that this is what the human race needed and the irony is so thick that I am writing about this on September 11^th that you can cut it with a knife.

I always liked to say that what the world needed was a good old-fashioned alien invasion. Now, stick with me on this one. See, here in Oklahoma the Bedlam game is always a big deal. That is where the Oklahoma Sooners meet the Oklahoma State Cowboys on the football field. On that day, the state is divided down the center. The line in the sand is clear. But even if you run around saying “Orange Power” 364 days out of the year, when the Sooners take on Texas for the Red River Rivalry, you root for Oklahoma – if only for that day. 

Here in Oklahoma, we hate Texas. But if Texas is playing Florida State University for a national championship, we will root for Texas because they are closer to us than Florida. But if that same guy that we booed against from Florida is playing in the Olympics, we root for him simply because he is from the United States.

So if the aliens of Glorgnak VII invaded Earth, for the first time, we as a human race would have a single enemy to rally around. On September 11^th, 2001, it seemed like all of the United States was galvanized from the attack on us from a foreign threat. It was all of us looking forward in the same direction. I remember that time so clearly. School shootings and violence towards each other suddenly seemed unthinkable because you had an exterior threat knocking on our door.

I guess, in a way, the zoms are my alien invasion. They don’t care about skin color, ethnicity, creed, heritage, political affiliation, your stance on abortion, or if you do or do not think that One Direction and Britney Spears was the downfall of music as we know it. At the end of the day, zoms have become a great equalizer. They are relentless. Don’t care if you are white, black, gay, straight, pro-life, pro-choice…

All that petty bickering and in fighting has fallen to the wayside. And I think it is because the zoms certainly are not fighting amongst themselves. So how can we afford to? Do you really think I care if you are Democrat or a Republican if the horde is closing in? Hell, no. I just care how well you can fire that weapon or beat back this wave of undead.

Kyle Reese warned Sarah Connor: It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead. Zoms are the same way people. So you better put all that aside if you want to survive…

Day 135 – FoS: Rooftop Access

Almost from the beginning of the siege, one of our real saving graces was the rooftop access hatch. It is positioned above the ice cream freezers and is accessed by way of a hand-over-hand vertical ladder. We had to get the keys from the office to get through the padlocks but we accessed the roof almost on the first night if memory serves. We wanted to look down on the chaos that was swirling around outside without exposing ourselves or attracting attention.

It is from this rooftop perspective that we spotted Brad and his crew across the way. It is from this vantage point that we have taken out a pretty large number of zoms from the sniper position.

If you read this blog regularly, you know that we have started utilizing the roof space more. We are up there for weapons training. Memorial Day and the Fourth of July were celebrated up there. The smokers have agreed to go to roof to smoke so as not to piss off those that don’t smoke… But I also think that we need up there just for good mental health. I know there is a real correlation between mental health and sunlight. And with us closing off the windows with tin foil, we are not getting the sunlight exposure that we all need. Who wants to walk around with rickets?

Currently, Lance has some plan that he has been talking about where he is going to rewire the security cameras that were used inside (no longer as necessary) so that we can have more external cameras for when the weather starts to get bad and we want to hunker down more but still need eyes outside.

The rooftop access is a nice benefit because we feel like we can get out in the open and fresh air without really exposing ourselves to the dangers that are right on our doorstep.

I will say this for our group. If there is one thing that we do well, it is think long term. Some of the people are working this week to stash a few emergency essentials like 5-gallon water jugs, rations, toiletries, and some “last resort” ammo and weapons. This is all on the off-hand chance that the store gets overrun. Given that our structure would probably be the equivalent of a three story building, we cannot fathom any possible way that the zombies can reach the roof. Even if the interior of the store is overrun, I don’t see the zoms having the mental capacity to storm the ice cream freezer and then climb hand over hand to break through the hatch that we would have barricaded from on top of the roof. We know they can climb stairs but when it comes to the physical coordination required to actually climb a hand-over-hand ladder, they just don’t have it. So from that aspect, we feel we are pretty safe on the roof.

Still I cannot imagine the struggles of trying to get to the roof if we had to go outside to do it. Thank goodness for that hatch and that we knew about it.

Day 134 – Taking The Phrase “Brain Panning” To A WHOLE New Level

So I am kind of starting to see the down side of not going out on scavenging sortie missions. Idle hands are the devil’s playthings and we need to do stuff to keep some of our survivors (the young ones specifically) more entertained.

See, the pharmacy features one of those old school, drive through bank window drawers that they could use to give pills to people in their cars. It is far too small to have to worry about a zombie fitting through but we did have to reinforce the window that the pharmacy tech used to talk to the customers.

Now, I think we have made it clear that to zoms meat is meat. They will eat people, dogs, cats, pretty much anything they can get their hands on. Also consider that their sense of smell seems to be enhanced too and they are keen when it comes to tracking blood. This is either genius or sick.

The guys took a lot of the bloody packaging from the thawed ground beef along with some meat scraps and other inedible stuff. Can you see where this is going? They put all that stuff in the pharmacy drawer and then opened it up to the outside world. Sure enough, it didn’t take the zoms too long to find it. This is when the snipers went to work from their perched positions on the roof. But this was as close as we had gotten to figuratively shooting fish in a barrel.

So the guys came up with something a little… different. They attached a cinderblock to a length of rope and extended it from the building pendulum style so that they could swing it. The length of the rope, the set up with the pendulum and the spacing of the swing made to where if you are looking in that extended drawer, that cinderblock will literally take a zombie head off.

Then the younger guys would all laugh and laugh. We had to put a stop to the process when the cinderblock careened off a zoms head and spun into the window in front of the bank drawer. Thankfully, most of the momentum had been blunted. There is now a small chip in the glass where the block made contact. I cannot imagine the chaos if the window had shattered out. I think it would be pretty hard for functioning zoms to climb up through the window given the height and stuff but why take chances?

And now we have a small collection of bodies stacked up outside the pharmacy that we will have to deal with. But there are that many less zoms running around in the world now and the guys all got to have a good – if technically a sadistic – time.

Boys will be boys.